


Still, My Wild Heart, For Adventure Shall Come Soon

by solroha



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Gen, Old Friends, One Shot, Other, Planning Adventures, Projection, Self-Doubt, Short One Shot, Stream of Consciousness, Wanderlust, World Travel, gotta keep up that best friend rep, it’s mentioned but not completely clear so, josh is really only mentioned but he's still there, ty wants to travel, vent fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-22
Updated: 2019-06-22
Packaged: 2020-05-16 09:37:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19315516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/solroha/pseuds/solroha
Summary: Tyler has always wanted to travel. What for, he isn’t sure. But he knows he needs to get out of this suffocatingly-small town before it finally takes his last breath.





	Still, My Wild Heart, For Adventure Shall Come Soon

**Author's Note:**

> tbh i started writing this at 1 am and it became a projection of a lot of things i’m feeling. it’s also a bit of stream of consciousness writing so my apologies if it feels all over the place or doesn’t make sense. i just need to travel and get out of here. soon. soon i will.

Tyler could never understand how people were so content staying in one place. Growing up, graduating school, and settling down in one place. It was too stagnant for him. Too much of one thing. Repetitive, boring, monotonous. Tyler wanted to leave. 

He wanted to stand up from his porch and walk right off into the world. He didn’t care if he had almost nothing to his name, he just didn’t want to be where he was. The same people, every day. Empty and meaningless “hello’s” dripping from his mouth like sap when people nodded his way. 

He looked into the vacant street in front of his house, pulling his knees closer to his chest. The gentle pitter-patter of rain hitting the cars and tin drainage pipes filled his head between thoughts. It was early in the morning, not early enough for the sun to peek its head over the horizon, but early enough for the sky to be blushed with a blue hue. He felt content like this. Stuck between the night and the day, cold wrapping him like a blanket and sending shivers through his body every few minutes. 

Tyler felt a shiver start in his chest before his shoulders and body followed. He sniffled and wiped his running nose on his sleeve. The street in front of his house tempted him, whispering promises of carrying him somewhere he had never been. Somewhere new and exciting. But at the same time it only led him to places he knew. An empty park three streets down, dotted with sparse memories of better times. Times before Tyler felt the itch for adventure under his skin. 

A flash lit up the sky, stealing his attention from the worn pavement. A distant train whistle stealing the show from the rain. _3 am_ he thought. Tyler let out a laugh of disbelief and shook his head. He had such a boring routine that he knew what time it was from the train. 

He was bored here. 

Tyler shivered once again, tugging his flannel tighter to his body as he sat up. The cold didn’t bother him now. It was welcomed if anything; bringing something new to his usually-too-warm town. 

He thought about adventure as another flash of lightning danced across the sky. Adventure. Travel. The America’s and Europe and Asia and everywhere between and away. He thought about the people, what were their stories? Did they wish for adventure too?

A lamppost flickered and Tyler looked across the street, new thoughts and doubts working into his mind. Was his wanderlust unrightfully so? Should he be content with where he was? Should he be thankful that he knew each crack and crevice of the streets so well? That he could tell you how many potholes on his street had been filled over the years and how many hadn’t? Should the routine be comforting? Everyone else seemed to be settled and happy with it. 

No, he had a right to feel this way. He had never been more than one state away from his hometown. He had never travelled anywhere exotic or interesting. New York and California seemed like fairytales. Fairytales that could hold his dreams. 

His thoughts branches out further as he continued to think, the rain barely letting up around him.

He didn’t know what his dreams were. What ambitions he had. Hobbies he could name for hours, but when familiar faces asked him familiar questions, _what are you studying at school? What do you want to do when you graduate? Have you thought about any jobs that interest you?_ he couldn’t name a single thing. 

He loved sports and art and music but neither seemed realistic to him. He remembered his parents telling him art school was expensive and a waste of time and money. He remembered being told he started basketball too late to become someone. He remembered his friends laughing when he mentioned his desire to pursue music. He remembered all the times he was put down, even if the words hadn’t been meant that way. He remembered when all the doubts of _am I good enough_ started forming in his head. 

Maybe that was another reason he wanted to get away. Maybe he had a delusion that he could leave behind all these thoughts if he got out. Scrape out his internal-self and walk away a shell of what he should be. An empty vessel ready to become someone whole once again. Maybe that’s why adventure appealed to him so much. 

Waking up somewhere new every day. He didn’t care if he had someone by his side or if it was only him and the clothes on his back. Although someone else by his side would be reassuring. 

A breeze blew past him, wind whispering through his hair and pricking at his skin through the holes of his shirt. Tyler replaces the breath of the wind with his frozen fingers, pushing his hair from his face. He shuddered as his cold hands met the back of his neck. 

Too cold. 

He put one hand under his knee, trapping it between his thigh and calf, and brought the other to his mouth. He exhaled onto his closed fist, thankful for the momentary relief of warmth against his ghostly digits. He still invited the cold in the back of his mind. 

The rhythms of the rain brought back memories as he continued to try and thaw his hands. He remembered sneaking out of his house a few years back, only to be yelled at by his mother the next morning when she found out. He remembered sitting in his friend’s car, blasting music as loud as the old, worn down speakers would allow, and singing his heart out to his favorite song. He remembered crying underneath the porch covering after getting his heart broken when he was young and naïve. He mostly remembered the good. 

He thought back to empty promises he had made once with his then-best friend. The promise to travel. That’s when this seed was planted. When a boy with faded pink hair watched the stars pass with him and made him promises of starting a band and making a name for themselves so they could finally escape this wretched idle town. The seed was planted but then left to rot, but instead it had flourished and in its place was a tree that was slowly suffocating Tyler from the inside. 

The branches were overgrown and starting to poke and prod their ways into Tyler and casting shadows too dark to let anything else grow inside of him. He itched with hope for adventure. 

An itch that only got more intense each day, slowly turning into a burn. He needed to leave before a a wildfire started and killed everything inside him. Maybe it would one day be enough to kill him too. 

Tyler heard the train once again, further away now, but still ringing in his head. The whistle died out and he focused on the rain. The way it sounded different when it hit the pavement versus the hood of his dad’s old car versus the cracking wooden beams above his head. He focused on the way the temperature attempted to cool the heat he had inside. 

It never worked. 

He never focused long enough. 

Tyler wiped a tear from his face, his hands still cold despite his effort and feeling even colder against his raw cheeks. He let out a frustrated grunt as another tear chased after the other. His face hurt from rubbing at it with the coarse flannel material but he rubbed away. He didn’t want to feel so pathetic. 

All he had to do was conform to this town and he would fit in perfectly. Get a summer job at the gas station or a grocery store and save up enough money to help him move out of his parents’ house and put him through another year of college. Find someone and go steady with them until he decided to settle down in a house only a block away from the one he grew up in. Adjust to the reality of only seeing the same faces day after day. Adjust to this pathetic excuse for a life. 

But Tyler didn’t want to conform. He wanted to rebel and lash out, show this place that it couldn’t suffocate him and make him fit into a mold that wasn’t made for him. He would make money in his own way. He would save up to finally buy a passport and a backpack and travel with whatever he could fit in it. He would walk right out of this town and he wouldn’t fucking look back. 

Tyler smiles at his plan, still numb inside and hurting as he fed the wild tree that grew inside him, but plans helped. Made everything feel more real. Inspired him. 

He quickly stood up on his porch and looked out onto the street with hope. Hope that one day the road would lead him somewhere new rather than everywhere had already been. Maybe it would be soon, if he were lucky. 

But for now, he wasn’t. 

For now, all he could do was turn on his heels and walk through the creaky door of the building he called home and wrap himself in one too many blankets in an attempt to drown out the noise of the rain that echoed in his chest. For now he would settle with where he was. With having no ambitions and no plans other than to escape. For now, he would shove himself into a life that didn’t feel like it belonged to him. 

He hoped the absent feeling of not seeming like he belonged here wouldn’t kill him before he could leave. 

With a heavy breath he whispered to his beating heart to still. Still for adventure will come soon enough. 

But for now he must sleep where he is and pray he can one day belong.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading. follow my on twt if you wanna: @ crushedconfetti


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